be the result of a well-arranged system of representation, there could be little room for want of harmony with the executive, the simple function of which would be to carry into effect the measures which the legislature had decreed; and there could certainly be no room for any remedy to discord, but submission to the public sentiment expressed through its constitutional organs, after the requisite inquiry and discussion.

In the preceding remarks we have scarcely adverted to the trouble, disorders, and expense of elections, because they are reducible by proper regulations to an inconsiderable inconvenience and outlay. Under the actual system, indeed, the evils of an election are so formidable, as almost to destroy the wish of seeing the term of service abbreviated. The whole process, from the canvassing for votes to the business of the poll-booth, appears almost as if it had been contrived for the express purpose of discouraging any desire to bring back the constitution to triennial parlia

ments.

P

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE ELECTORAL BODY.

THE preceding discussions have brought us to a point, where we shall be able to examine with advantage the principles on which the formation of the electoral body ought to proceed. They have marked out the relation subsisting between the constituents and the representative, and shown how far the latter ought to be dependent on the former.

Hence we are in a situation to determine what qualities it is desirable to have combined in the constituent body, and what are the motives which the public good requires it to be placed under or protected against, by its composition. Knowing the specific purpose for which the franchise is conferred, we are prepared to examine into whose hands it should be entrusted. We are also in a favourable position for investigating the principles which should regulate the distribution of the electoral body into separate

constituencies; and, lastly, the result of these inquiries, in conjunction with our antecedent conclusions, will enable us to define the relation in which the electors stand to other classes, and to the community at large.

SECTION I.

On the Constitution of the Electoral Body.

From the view which we have taken of the relation in which constituents and representatives stand to each other, we see the exact nature of the functions which the electors have to perform. These functions may indeed be summed up in one expression; they may be designated as being the selection of deputies to the supreme legislature. Yet this, without due consideration of all which it implies, would give a very inadequate notion of what is devolved upon the electors, and of the influence which they exercise.

When a new constituency have first to choose a representative, their business may appear simple enough, as embracing nothing more than an examination of the pretensions of the aspirants to the office, and a selection of one out of the number, according to the evidence which happens to be

within their reach. Taking an insulated transaction of this kind, the duty of the electors may seem at once easy and comparatively uninfluential; although even here there is a demand for knowledge and discrimination on the part of those who have to choose. But when a whole system of representation is taken into view, when it is considered that there is a periodical return of this process of selection, and that the attention of the electors is continually drawn to the conduct of their representative in his office, the business strikes the mind as more complicated, and the influence exercised by the electoral body over the national councils appears in a more important light. The candidates, it will be found, are for the most part men who have already been members of the legislature; who have been in the habit of expressing their sentiments; who have participated in a variety of public transactions; who have thus presented to their constituents a train of acts for examination and judgment; and who, in the whole of their career, have had in constant prospect the day when they were again to submit themselves to a public election.

For the electors to be competent to form any thing like a correct opinion of the circumstances thus brought before them, and to exert benefi

cially that control over the proceedings of the legislature which is thus placed in their hands, they must obviously possess a certain degree of intelligence and discrimination, although the precise degree required cannot be expressed.

It is true, that there is not the same demand for knowledge on the part of the electors, nor the same influence exercised by them on the legislature, as there would be on the erroneous doctrine, that it is their province to instruct the representative how he should act. On that erroneous supposition, it would be requisite that the electors individually should be competent to deal with all the difficult and complicated questions of legislation, and the legislature itself would exhibit nothing but an exact impress of their own character: but according to the sounder principle, that the function of the electors is to incite and check, and not to instruct, both a lower degree of influence is possessed, and a lower degree of intelligence is requisite ; a capability, namely, of judging of a man's moral and intellectual character and fitness for the office from his conduct and reputation, with all the aids supplied, in the constant scrutiny to which he is liable, by the assaults of his enemies and the eulogiums of his friends.